Tui, Europe’s biggest travel company, has urged its shareholders to support a plan to abandon its London stock market listing in favour of a single listing in Frankfurt when it goes to a vote on Tuesday.
The German company said the move to drop its UK listing would simplify its structure and improve liquidity, in the run-up to an investor vote at its annual meeting. It came as Tui also reported a surprise profit and record revenues in the Christmas quarter on strong demand for travel.
The company decided to vote on the delisting, which requires a majority of 75% of votes at the AGM, after some shareholders suggested a shift to Germany could lower costs and provide “support for EU airline ownership”.
Tui has said about 77% of share transactions are settled directly via the German share register, while less than a quarter of trading in Tui shares is in the form of UK depositary interests.
If shareholders approve the plans it would be seen as a further blow to the reputation of the London Stock Exchange.
Last month, the betting company Flutter listed in New York and said it would switch its primary listing from London, with shareholders due to vote on the proposal in May.
Last year, the Cambridge-based chip designer Arm, one of the UK’s few bona fide global tech success stories, snubbed London in favour of floating on the Nasdaq in New York, in one of the biggest initial public offering in recent years.
Tui’s vote on its future listing arrangements comes as the company reported an unexpected profit of €6m in the final quarter of last year, compared with a loss of €153m in the same period in 2022.
Revenues soared 15% year-on-year to €4.3bn, a record for the quarter, which the company said was driven by higher demand at improved prices and rates.
Sebastian Ebel, the chief executive of Tui, said: “People’s willingness to travel is still high, despite a market environment that remains challenging. We are on track, we are gaining customers and we are growing. We are accelerating our transformation quarter by quarter.”
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Tui, which cut its debt from €5.3bn to €4bn by the end of last year, maintained its full-year forecast of a 10% increase in revenues and a 25% uplift in profits.
The company said winter and summer bookings were up 8% year on year, and average prices were up 4%. Tui has 9.4m bookings for winter and summer combined, up on 8.7m last year.
